Improvement in preserving food



w. A. KEELER.

Preserving Food.

vrz'ifiesses; l'rlll L V I or.

UNITED Sratns Farnnr rrrcn.

IVILLIAM A. KEELER, OF NEV YORK, N. Y.

IMPROVEMENT IN PRESERVING FOOD.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 29,383, dated July 31, 1860.

.To all whom it may concern.-

Be it known that I, XVILLIAM A. KEELER, of the city, county, and State of New York, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Putting Up Butter, &c., so as to prevent injury from external heat; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear,.and exact description of the construction, charac ter, and operation of the same, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, which make part of this specification, in which Figure 1 is a perspective view of the outside cask, with a space broken away to show the in side cask and the plaster which surrounds it. Fig. 2 is a section of the same, cut longitudinally through the center, showing the relative position of the two casks and the plaster between them.

My improvement consists in placing the cask or vessel, which contains the butter (or other analogous substance) within another cask, and yet having it perfectly insulated by plaster-of-paris from the outer cask, so as .to prevent solar or other external heat from penetrating to the. butter to injure it. I make the outside cask (in any of the usual ways or otherwise) in a substantial manner, as represented at A, Fig. 1, and indicated in section at A A, Fig. 2, with a hole in one of its heads, as shown at a, 1 and 2. I make the inner cask or vessel, which is designed to contain the butter, (or other article,) in any of the usual ways, (or otherwise,) in a substantial manner, as indicated at B, Fig. 1, and also in section at B B, Fig. 2. Having thus prepared or made the two casks, I fill the cask B with butter, as indicated at C, Fig. 2, (with any desired or approved mode of packing,) or with any other analogous substances, and head it up in the usual way air-tight. I then pour (properly prepared) plaster-ofparis into cask A to the depth of a few inches, (according to the size of the cask,) and set in the filled cask B and press it down into the plaster, but not so far as to touch the lower head of the cask A, as indicated at Z), Figs. 1 and 2. I then put the head D into the cask A, and drive down the hoops to their proper places, (as shown in Fig. 1 and indicated in Fig. 2,) and pour in prepared plaster through the hole in the head D until the cask A is completely filled, and drive in the plug (1, Figs. 1 and 2, when the casks A and B and the plaster E E E b will sustain the relative positions indicated in section in Fig. 2, the cask Bbeing perfectly insulated in the plasterthat is, having no connection with the cask A, except through the medium of the plaster.

I am aware that plaster-ot paris has long been used between the outer and inner casings of fire-proof safes to prevent (by its non-conducting quality) the burning of articles within the safe; but in such instances the two casings have always come more or less in contact, or have been united to each other in sundry places by metallic connection. I therefore do not claim any such as my invention; but

\Vhat I claim as my invention, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is

The use of two casks with the intermediate filling of plaster, when they are so arranged that the inner cask shall be perfectly insulated by the plaster, substantially as and for the purpose herein describedlVllI. A. KEELER.

Witnesses:

J as. R. Knnrnn, E. A. HOPKINS. 

